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Saturday, September 15, 2012

Lincoln Trailer

I'm on a bit of a Steven Spielberg kick lately, having just picked up the nice, new Blu-Ray of Jaws. It was the first time I'd seen Jaws from beginning to end. I've written a Fishing in the Discount Bin on it, and it'll probably be online in a few months, but long story short, Jaws blew me away. It was only Spielberg's second theatrical film, but to see so many of his trademark director flourishes already in play...it just speaks to his confidence as a director.

So it's a massive coincidence then that, with my kick going on, that we get the trailer for Spielberg's next film, Lincoln. Spielberg's been trying to get a biography of Abraham Lincoln off the ground for about 10 years or so now. Spielberg was hoping to have it in theatres in 2009 for the 200th anniversary of Lincoln's birth, but various delays pushed it back. From what I gather from Wikipedia, most of those delays had to do with Spielberg ordering more drafts of the script, to get it just right.

All those delays, though, wound up costing Spielberg his star. Liam Neeson was attached for the longest time to play Lincoln, but all those delays started conflicting with Neeson's schedule, so he had to quit the project. That paved the way, though, for legendary Oscar-winning actor Daniel Day-Lewis to take on the role.

Also in the cast is Sally Field as Mary Todd Lincoln, Joseph Gordon-Levitt as his oldest son Robert Todd Lincoln, and Tommy Lee Jones as Thaddeus Stevens. It's Oscar-bait of the highest caliber.

I've got a lot of catching up to do on Spielberg films. I have yet to see Munich, or his two films that he released last year, War Horse and The Adventures of Tintin. Methinks a trip to the video store is in order.

Makes me think though that I'll have to make the effort to catch Lincoln in theatres. It comes out on November 16.

and because I need a thumbnail for when I post this on the social networks, here's the poster.